You’re listening to Wet Shaving Talk powered by Sharpologist.com where we’re dedicated to preserving the art and skill of classic shaving. I’m your host Joe Borrelli and today is June 23rd, 2025.
____________________________________________________________________________
Today on the Show:
Summer is Here!!
What’s Up With Menthol: How To Beat the Heat!
Why Does Wet Shaving Bring You Peace?
Are you a Collector? Or a User? Why I Think You Should Use Your Stuff!
Emails from Listeners
___________________________________________________________________________
What’s Up With Menthol: How to Beat the Heat!
Mentholated products are a great way to beat the heat! They provide a cooling effect that can make you feel fresh and cool especially during the hot summer months. Derived mainly from mint leaves, there are synthetic versions available.
There are some side effects, for those with sensitive skin, so always try a little before you go all in (I personally have issues with some items).
Many artisans make products with Menthol:
-The Holy Black Creeper Line
-PAA Frost Byte
-Stirling Glacial
For more information check out this link on Sharpologist:
____________________________________________________________________________
Why Does Wet Shaving Bring You Peace?
Does wet shaving bring you peace? An interesting post on B&B opened up this subject to me. I’ll tell you my thoughts and how it’s brought me peace for over a decade.
____________________________________________________________________________
Are You A Collector or a User? Why I Think You Should Use Your Stuff!
Are there parts of your collection you don’t use in fear of it getting damaged or losing value?
I’l tell you my thoughts and why every piece of my collection gets used!
____________________________________________________________________________
Emails From Listeners
I received some great emails from listeners. I’ll tell you all about them here!
____________________________________________________________________________
Mantic’s New Site: The Black Coffee Life
MAntic has a new site dedicated to coffee: Check it out: https://theblackcoffeelife.com/
____________________________________________________________________________
Our show is powered by Sharpologist.com, “What Your Father Didn’t Teach You about Shaving”
Special Thanks to:
Mark aka Mantic 59
Most of All……….YOU!!!!
Don’t forget to check out my blog site www.shavestraightandsafe.com for the tips and interesting wet shaving stories!
Please feel free to contact me at [email protected]
Subscribe to my You Tube Chanel for videos regarding some interesting wet shaving content.
Don’t forget to check out my book “The Modern Guide to Straight Razor Shaving” available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and at Pasteur’s Pharmacy in NYC.
If you’re a vendor and would like to be featured on the show please contact me!!
Next Show: 7/725
Transcript (Machine-Generated)
You’re listening to Wet Shaving Talk powered by Sharpologist.com, where we’re dedicated to preserving the art and skill, classic shaving. I’m your host Joe Borelli and today is June 23rd, 2025. Alright everyone, welcome back to the podcast glad to see you all here today on this beautiful Start of summer day. That’s right.
It is the start of summer and we are in full-fledged Most parts of the country right now. I mean there’s been a heat wave going on So I thought what better way to talk about a heat wave than to talk about how to beat the heat so With the show today, we’re going to talk a little bit about menthol in the products that you have, wet shaving products, how to beat the heat with those items, and give you a little bit of relief when you walk out the door, especially after getting ready in the morning or when you do your shave at night, and just getting that little blast of coolness on your face and what it causes and what it does, and really just a few products that have it that are readily available that you can get.
There are a lot of items that have the menthol in it, and it will give you that cooling effect. and also a few things that might make you allergic to it as well as with me, so we’ll talk a little bit about that. and why I saw this on Badger and Blade this week. Why does shaving, wet shaving, bring you peace?
A couple people posted on that. I actually had quite a few posts. It was posted as a thread on Badger and Blade and I was really interested in that and I was going to tell you what brings me peace with wet shaving and why actually, you know, why it makes a lot of sense on how it’s like just a little bit of a peaceful thing or an event that happens on a daily basis that you can enjoy often.
Are you a collector? Are you a user? Why I think you should use your stuff. That’s right, guys.
There are a lot of collectors out there that like to put stuff in boxes or hold them. And I feel you shouldn’t do that. I think you should use your items. Use your products.
Use your collectibles. And I’ll tell you exactly why and what I think about the whole collecting aspect of wet shaving in a nutshell, I guess to say. So guys, without further ado, let’s get on with the show. So what’s up with menthol and how can it beat the heat in the summer months?
So mentholated products are a great way to beat the heat and by providing a cooling effect that can make you feel fresh, cool, especially during these hot summer months a lot of humidity and it’s derived mainly from mint leaves or and there’s also synthetic versions as well what it really does is it gives you that real cooling breezy like aspect and kind of like i guess it makes it a little that makes you feel a little tingly at times as well there are a lot of items that do carry it uh… carry a little menthol in it and there’s some really good um… there’s a really good website excuse me uh…
posts on sharpologist about What is menthol and why is it in my shaving stuff? So I actually put a link in the show notes to this. So what it is, it’s basically an organic compound really obtained from mint oils or can be made synthetically. So a lot of wet shaving vendors are using synthetic menthol.
I think it’s probably more on the affordable side. It’s also easier to find, I would guess, and you don’t have to really divide. It’s probably easier to make. I’m not sure.
I don’t know much about it. But what it really does is it activates the body receptor structures found in the skin and cold sensitive areas, making you feel cold. And it does, it kind of gives you like a little cold message to the brain from the nerves, I guess, in your, on your skin. So it’s got like a, almost like an anesthetic, like a kind of like a, like a, I guess, how to Like it kind of almost clogs up my nose I guess it makes you cut and I my face also breaks out a little bit So I got to
go easy on the methylated products, but I do love it when you shave with them Okay Let me just give you a little insider when you actually shave With a methylated shave soap and then use and follow up with with like aftershave or something like that in that sense right or bomb You go outside and you feel cold like it will feel like a kind of I don’t know guys if you’ve ever put like a muscle relaxer on which I’m guessing is probably methylated like a Bengay or something like that. You feel that tingly feel. It’s similar to that only just I don’t think you get the bad smell and also it’s a little bit more on the cooler side, right?
Some of them will warm, some of them cool. Icy hot would be an example when it’s the icy part of it, right? So it kind of feels good and it will also feel like when you go outside and you’re in the heat it kind of it does make you feel cooler as in the sense if you go in a sauna and you go right outside the hot in the hot human air you’ll feel like cooler right you’ll feel cooler for a few minutes and if you jump in the pool you’ll feel really cold.
Similar to that if you’ve been in a sauna you understand what I’m saying. So a lot of people use these products especially during the hot times because of that aspect the cooling aspect. Now there are lots of products that do it. If you’ve guys ever tried, it’s called the Holy Black Creeper line.
If you’ve ever tried that line that they usually come out with in the summertime, they’ve had a lavender creeper, they’ve had lots of different creepers, orange I think they’ve had, coconut, those have a ton of methanol in it. And I believe they use synthetic methanol in that. And that’s really to the extreme. Also, you have Phoenix Artisan Accoutrements Frostbite.
That’s another really intense. Soap that will really give you that cooling essence. And then Sterling, the Glacial line. There’s a whole line of Sterling where they put a lot of those, a lot of methylated crystals in your shaving stuff, in their soaps.
And you can get different scents and stuff like that. There’s also some sites online where you can actually buy the methyl yourself. I think PAA sells it, Phoenix Artisan Enrichments. I know the Shave Den store, she used to sell it over there.
Not sure if she still does and I’m pretty sure you could probably find it on Amazon if you wanted to. And you can add it to anything. You can add it to your own aftershaves. You can really methylate anything.
So, in short, if you guys are looking for a quick way to beat the heat, especially with these high temperatures going on right now and the heat wave up north, and if you live in the southeast like I do, you really kind of get used to the heat after a few years. It’s just going to be there every single day. There’s nothing you can really do about it.
but this is a great way to do it. You can try this out, try these out. I do recommend trying it out sparingly when you first start because I’ve heard a lot of stories about people being allergic or having reactions to it and that’s kind of my boat as well. So check out the, also guys, the link I left in the show notes to the Mantix article, What is Menthol and Why Is It in My Shaving Stuff?
And see if you can get some more information and see if it’s for you and then If you want, try something out. Let me know the results. See what you guys think if you haven’t tried one. And yeah, see if you could beat the heat in a wet shaving style.
All right, moving along. So why does wet shaving bring you peace? So does it in fact bring you peace? Do you feel more relaxed?
Do you feel peaceful after shaving or while you’re shaving? Or even while you’re Googling and searching for wet shaving products and shopping for them? So an interesting post on Badger & Blade really opened up for me. I took a look at it and I saw this subject and I started thinking about it.
Does it bring me peace? A lot of people responded that it does because it’s the few minutes a day that they get to themselves and You know, it’s just fun that to do a hobby or to have something special, you know reserve for yourself every day So I will agree this does bring peace and I’m gonna say that there’s a lot of things that bring people peace Right. I talked to a gentleman the other day and you know some people Use do small things like example There’s a gentleman that this at the coffee shop that I go to pretty quite often He says that this place is his piece like every day before work.
He likes to sit down He gets something to eat. He drinks a coffee and goes to work from that coffee shop So I asked him I said hey man, you’re here every single day, you know, why don’t you try a different place? He’s like well this place brings me peace because I like to relax and it’s like a routine and it’s something I do for myself every day and Just to give myself that little kick start and to treat myself daily. You know, yeah, it might be $4, $5 for coffee, but it’s just what I do for me.
And I thought about it and I, and you know, he made a really good point because I think for myself, it’s wet shaving every morning. So I wake up every day and for my own personal self, I will make sure that I shave. Before work, after work, whatever I do every day. I like to do it in the morning because it gives me a kick start.
I used to be a night shaver, I shave at night when I first started because it takes longer, you know, to wet shave when you’re starting out, especially with a straight razor. I’ve I think of it as like hey I accomplished something that most people don’t before I even leave my house right if you’re shaving with a straight razor or if you’re shaving with a safety razor and a brush and soap you can honestly say that 95% of people out there didn’t start their day with a skill like that. Most people don’t know anything about wet shaving.
They don’t know that. But think about challenging yourself. A classic thing for people to do is make their bed before they go to work every single day regardless if they live alone or if they live with people because it gives them that sense of accomplishment that they accomplished something that most people don’t do before they leave for work.
Well, I do like to make my bed and I also like to wet shave because I accomplish something that 95% of the people do, don’t do, right? And it gives me, I guess, a little sense of empowerment. It gives me a little boost and it makes me feel like, you know, I’m a little bit pumped up, to be honest with you, like I’m ready for the day just because I did it. And I can actually noticeably see a difference If I don’t, like if I don’t shave, I’m always touching my face, I feel like I’m missing something, I feel like I’m unkept because at work I like to make sure I’m professional, I look good.
Now granted, guys, beards are very acceptable in the workplace right now, right? You can do beards, no problem, nobody says anything. Most companies, even back in the day with retail, you used to not be able to have facial hair, you had to have short hair. No, it’s very lax in that area and beards are very widely accepted and a lot of people have a beard.
Most men at my work, I’d say 90% of them have a beard of some sort, with the exception of myself, which I used to have one. I tried one out for a few years, but I guess you could say It’s a way to accomplish something, give yourself a little bit of time to you and celebrate yourself every single day even though most of us are celebrating others most of the time, right? As a parent, your kids come first and we know that. As a friend, your friends come first, your work comes first, whatever.
Usually you’re going to work every day. And even if you own your own business and you own your own or you don’t work at all, you usually you’re working, doing something for someone else. So why not treat yourself on a daily basis, whether it be a cup of coffee or a clean wet shave in the morning. So that’s how I think of it.
And that’s really how the article went through with everybody and what it really came about. So does wet shaving bring you peace? Let me know. Send me an email.
I’d love to talk about it. All right. Are you a collector? Are you a user?
Why I think you should do both. So there are parts of your collection that you never use and you have a fear of getting damaged or losing value. Well, guys, I’m here to tell you my thoughts on this whole thing. And it’s, uh, well, I say, use it, use it or lose it.
So a lot of guys will say, Hey, I have a really rare razor. I don’t want to use it. Cause I don’t want to ruin it. Right.
I don’t want to destroy it. It’s I want to preserve it. And that’s great and all, but I could tell you guys right now that these razors are meant to be used. They can be used and they, and you should use them.
And I’ll tell you exactly why. Why Not? Subscribe in US English I’ve shaved with a straight razor several straight razors from the 1700s 1800s you know and that’s the reason like a lot of people say why would you use that it’s been it’s been around for 200 years you should you shouldn’t use it Well, you know what?
I know I probably shouldn’t, but I’m going to because it is awesome to use a razor that’s 200 years old. I can tell you that is pretty cool, right? And it’s a lot of fun to collect and say to people, hey, this works too, especially with safety razors. Safety razors don’t need as much work as a straight razor will need to get a shave ready.
For example, my straight razor I got from the 1700’s, my EVAT that I had. I did do an article on Sharpologist about that some time ago. and this razor had a lot of history to it and needed a lot of work. I kept the original scales but of course the blade needed to be re-honed.
It actually needed to be re-ground. I was able to do all that work myself. It took me about a week or two to do it and it shaves perfectly now. It shaves beautifully.
It’s great. Yeah, it might be a little bit altered from when I found it. and may have lost a little bit of metal and may be a little bit cleaned up. But it’s really, the value of the item probably didn’t go down at all.
I don’t think it’s really worth much. I don’t know how much they’re worth. But I paid about $100 for it, right? And that’s a lot for a straight razor that’s that old that needed work.
But it’s fun. I really enjoy collecting it. And I love using it every now and then. And I love just trying it out and looking at new things.
I love using vintage Kamisari Japanese straight razors. I think those are awesome. A lot of people think they are collector’s items. To me, I don’t mind.
I use it. If it gets a scratch on it, hey, we’ll live. I could polish it out if needed. So I do understand guys, some items might be really historic to you, might have a lot of meaning to you, might be worth a lot of money.
There are razors worth thousands of dollars out there. But you know what, if you use it, I highly doubt you’re going to hurt it. I think that if you did hurt it or break it, there are places, Razor Emporium fixes those vintage Gillette razors no problem. They can make it look brand new and better than new with better coatings than came from the factory.
There are several companies that do that now. uh… and they’re now i think reason for him to even making parts for jillette razors now yeah they’re making the springs are making uh… handles for vintage tech razors i mean they’re making a lot of a lot of uh…
parts and i have a feeling they’re gonna make more because i got a cnc machine now so they might even make more parts for the so that the part the day of hey you buy a jillette and you break something on it are are they might be coming to an end to where hey you break something on it hey we’ll make the part for you we’ll fix it may not be a hundred percent original but it’ll be a hundred percent functional i say guys use it or lose it no point in just in just not using your yours your beautiful shaving stuff if you can again there’s some people that don’t want to use it that just like holding it just like i know some several watch collectors that don’t wear half their watches and to me it’s like hey man wear it you know enjoy it Have a smaller collection and wear your stuff more often.
Or whatever, but wear those watches that you spend all your time looking for and having. Because that’s really what they’re for, and that’s what they were made to do. But I understand if you don’t. I understand it’s a collector item, whatever.
But that’s my take on it, guys. And I’ll stick to it. Alright guys, so I did receive a few emails from a few listeners here and I wanted to go over it. This was a few weeks ago.
I didn’t have a chance to talk about it on the last podcast but if you guys send me an email I will feature it or talk about it on the show. I did receive an email from Tim and Tim was very gracious and he sent me a Weber DLC Razor So he’s been listening to, he’s been a long time listener, actually listened to this podcast and the one by Rick DeWeese, I don’t know if you guys remember. Rick, Rick was doing a podcast before here, before mine and I believe I, actually I, he actually inspired me to do so because I was listening to his podcast and I really enjoyed it. And then I heard, you know, the story on Sharpologist, I heard that Andrew was looking for somebody, he was the original podcast host.
I joined him, you know, I just contacted him, joined him as like helping out, like an assistant, and then kind of took over after a little bit of time. But he’s been listening for a long time. And he, you know, offered to give me a Weber DLC safety razor. So that’s the one with the the black In a long time back in 2012 when they first started coming out they were the first one to be made in the United States off by an artisan really ever I think or since since the 80s with Gillette until Gillette
shut down production in the United States so this is the first and one of the better ones out there I believe so it’s actually turning into a quite a collectible item And I have this razor, and I’m going to try it out for a little bit. I’m trying to figure out how to, because I already have a Weber. I don’t have the DLC. So I’m going to figure out how to gift this razor along the lines in the future.
So I’m probably going to hold it until Christmas time or something like that and do a nice little giveaway around then. So I’ve got to say, Tim, thank you very much for, one, being a listener for many years, and two, for sending the razor. I was very ecstatic to get it. It was a very, very kind thing that you did and nice, and I appreciate it.
And we’re giving you a wet shaving talk salute virtually here. So thanks again, Tim, and look forward to hearing from you in the future. So I also received an email from a good friend of mine online, Abby. Abby’s been listening to the podcast for a while.
He’s also sent me several emails. And we go back and forth and talk here and there. And he sent me an email about the wet shaving market shift. and he you know he’s a he’s also he heard me talk about like how the market was the industry was changing mostly on the software side we talked about that a few weeks ago and a lot of people and he he as well shares that he’s he’s worried
about the market becoming oversaturated so talking about the the competition you know with mostly Innovation some artisans that would to go through a lot of different changes and stuff like that. We’re losing some artisans there there were noticeably fewer attendees at the Maggots meetup and you know looking at my database and Looking at out there out there in the world and in the wet shaving world. It is true. There are quite a few vendors that have shut down or slowly, you know kind of phased out and From where there were about five or six years ago, and that’s just because cost and all that stuff I think competitions and also competitions getting crazy And a lot of
he also mentioned he spoke to a few people there vendors one vendor mentioned that Many of the enthusiasts stocked up a ton during 2020 during the pandemic. We’re all sitting around boards We bought a lot so they’re not buying much and the bubble might have burst and you know realistically we looked at it talking about our wet shaving collections and most of us out there collectors and Abby is one of them has probably about a hundred years worth of shaving soap right if you kept all your soaps and use them didn’t buy another one you got about a hundred years worth so It’s just like, well, you know what? Maybe people are just slowing down in general.
And that’s kind of where I’m at. At one point, I had probably close to like 70, 80 soaps, maybe more. I don’t know. I started getting rid of a lot of them, because a lot of them started falling apart.
Some of them, I just didn’t use anymore, and I just ran out of space. And also, I wanted to use my collection. So I haven’t bought a shave soap other than maybe three to five shave soaps a year, when I used to buy probably 30. In the last couple of years because I’ve been using my stuff up but recently I want to I want to start supporting the artisans and you know listening to the reading this article and then just talking about You know, hey these guys might need some help with those
for their their businesses yeah i think i will definitely go through it so if you’re a vendor or you’re an artisan and you need some help or if you you want to talk about your product just send me an email alright send me an email and i will definitely mention you on the show we could talk about it i could try to work out an interview it’s it’s tough for me just because i don’t i still have any much time to do interviews to set up and collaborate and it’s just uh… it’s usually when you do that kind of stuff does take a lot of time so We’ll talk about it though. So definitely so Abby as always.
Thank you for sending me an email again It was really good enjoyed it. I always enjoy your guys’s emails Whenever you send it to me. I read every single one of them respond to them. So I have a lot of fun doing that and Really enjoy Abby as well your content because you always send good stuff and you’re always very Very active and very you have a very good perspective on the whatsaver world.
So thank you again for the email All right, everyone, that concludes the show for this week. That’s it. Talking about wet shaving and all that good stuff, man, it doesn’t get any better than that for us wet shavers. It’s still a lot of fun.
I’m going in on 10 years on this podcast and still enjoying every moment of it. I just wanted to remind you guys our show is powered by sharpologist.com, which your father didn’t teach you about shaving. Thanks to Mantic59 for everything that he does for the wet shaving community. And of course, most of all, you guys, the listeners.
Don’t forget to check out my blog site, ShaveStraightAndSafety.com. And always feel free to email me at joe.wetshavingnews.com. Remember, my book is out, still, The Modern Guide to Straight Razor Shaving, available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and at Pasteur’s Pharmacy in a brick and mortar location. Next show will be on the 7th of July.
Until then, shave straight and shave safe. Bye bye now.
